I am looking for a software program that would log the cpu usage of
each particular program using it at any given time.  I am not looking
for just a monitor but something that logs the cpu usage.  I would
prefer free-ware but would also be willing to pay for it.

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Request for Question Clarification by mathtalk-ga on 22 Jun 2004 16:06 PDT

The best solution will require some knowledge of your hardware and
operating system.  Is this a PC running a version of Windows, for
example?

regards, mathtalk-ga

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Clarification of Question by hooman1001-ga on 23 Jun 2004 10:17 PDT

This is a Dell Celeron PC, running on Windows 2K.  There is a memory
leak somewhere but a new PID gets assigned with some of our services
(POS software)so we can't track usage by PIDs and hence needing a log
of every program and their respective CPU usages.

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Request for Question Clarification by mathtalk-ga on 23 Jun 2004 13:18 PDT

Hi, hooman1001-ga:

Are you trying to log CPU usage or memory usage?  I ask because you
mention having "a memory leak somewhere".

regards, mathtalk-ga

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Clarification of Question by hooman1001-ga on 23 Jun 2004 14:04 PDT

My bad.  Forget about memory leak part.  Just the CPU usage.

Click ctrl alt & delete.

This brings up a windows task manager.  Click the processes tab.  This
lists all tasks & cpu usage.

Since you mentioned "our services" so I'm assuming you have an idea of
which processes you want to log.  If you have an idea of which
processes are problematic you can log CPU usage for selected process
names (don't have to tie it to a specific PID).  You can use Windows'
perfmon.exe (Start Menu -> Run... -> perfmon).  Although it is a
monitoring tool you can log the data to a file.

To use it, start up perfmon.exe.  Expand the "Performance Logs and
Alerts" tree.  Select "Counter Logs".  Right click on the main window
and select "New Log Settings..."  Type in a name.  Select "Add
Counters..."  Under "Performance object" select "Process".  Use the
default "% Processor Time" counter.  Now either select the suspected
instances or select "All instances".  Note that selecting all
instances only selects the processes running at that time, new
processes will not be added when started.  It will however handle the
case when a process stops and then starts again with a new PID. 
Select "Add" to add this counter and then select "Close".  Now set
your Interval to whatever you want.  Note that the smallest Interval
you can use with perfmon is 1 second.  You can download the Windows
2000 Resource Kit if you want to get perfmon4.exe which can gather
statistics at 1000 times a second.  Now select the "Log Files" tab and
select your log file type, you may want to save it to a Text (comma
separated or tab separated) file if you want to be able to view the
logs in a normal viewer.       Select "Configure..." if you want to
change the log file name and location.  Now select "Apply" and "OK". 
Select your log and use either the right click menu or the toolbar to
start.  This will continue to gather statistics until you tell it to
stop.

Well done ganon-ga, well done indeed. 

hooman, if you are around, ganon is right, what you are looking for is
already on your computer and works very well for these system checks.
A good tutorial on all the uses of perfmon is here on msdn
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnperfmo/html/perfmon.asp

And a basic(as in things a sys admin should know, but few do)
instruction page on TechNet which shows not only perfmon, but some
others as well is here ..
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/maintain/monitor/monrel.mspx

There are several other monitoring and sysetm check tools on the
Win2000 system. find them know them love them.

Just a personal note, and I'm not trying to be 'harsh' at all, and I
do, (man I do) understand that these things can be very frustrating,
but ... let's look at a bit of logic which may help you with this and
future problems like it, from a SysAdmin point of view.

You have a unknown event happening from an unIdentifed program stream,
performing possible memory, or cpu resource problems at an unknown
amount, triggered by an unknown cause ... so ... to battle this you
are going to install an unknown/untested on this system, freeware
utility, which puts threads to the CPU  to monitor it?  Um... isn't
that just a  little ... off? perhaps.(?)

When dealing with unknown behaviors like this at the system level it
is rarely a good idea to (add) anything to the system. It is better to
begin removing services, and bringing the sysetm down to a state where
only the barest needs are met to keep the pulse, and monitoring the
unknown by elimination.

After all, utilities created for Win servers ( by just about
everyone), are famous for memory leaks and unclosed processes .. You
would have probably found yourself chasing two.

just a thought for the future. 

good luck

webadept-ga

"System Monitor was designed to monitor Microsoft Windows computers on a network.

It can monitor the usage of CPU, Memory, Disk Drives and Network
Adapters. You can set it up to log events and create usage reports to
databases located anywhere on your network.

The data stored in these databases can then be view in its unaltered
form through System Monitor or processed by another application to
generate statistical data...."

http://www.softpedia.com/public/cat/13/5/13-5-38.shtml

You must configure a database to log a application. Like MySql or ODBC.

The previous program works very well. But, i will recomend you the last one.

=========================
ELM - Performance Manager
=========================

"# Health and Performance - monitoring performance is an important
part of maintaining and administering business-critical systems and
networks.
# Processes - monitor individual processes with the Process Monitor
which is multi-functional; it can let you know when a process has
exceeded the threshold of CPU usage you specify, and it can track when
processes are instantiated or terminated.
# Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) - periodically query the
WMI database and generate alerts when the results of the query
change."

WebSite: http://www.lyonware.co.uk/ELM-Performance-Manager.htm
Download: http://www.lyonware.co.uk/ELM-Performance-Manager-DOWNLOAD.htm